Introspect
by mousers mary
Summary: series of brief oneshot/drabble/ficlet things.
1. Maine gloomier

_author's note: this is my first ever fic. I don't think its all that good, but I had to set it free before I lost my nerve. Inspired by a kinkmeme captcha_

Maine gloomier

It had seemed a lifetime ago, standing frozen as the proverbial deer in the headlights, when the epiphany hit. As if an errant bolt of lightning from some far off storm entered your brain causing a cascading effect of synapses flickering to life and waking a long neglected area of your brain. This intangible center suddenly splayed open revealing a tiny universe shimmering with something like indigo, its ability and function bursting forward giving, if only on some sub-conscience level, the capacity for you to understand the voice and language and poetry of your personal totem. Like a revelation, you remember suddenly in what amounts to an agnostic's spiritual experience, how to _feel_.

The moment begins to evaporate into a fine mist, and feet and legs move in long strides as if they had a will of their own. You find yourself in a frenzied rush to the car you borrowed from a friend (who also happens to be your hero) tearing through the back hoping against hope you remembered to bring your notebook, forgetting to acknowledge its discovery until well after you've hastily jotted down all those dizzying thoughts and feelings and impressions before they short-circuit your already over electrified brain.

Now, an hour later, on the lonely highway, the mad and frantic back and forth rhythm of the metronome intended to clear vision in the dark and all encompassing rainfall snaps you out of any romantic notions. The rain falls hard, and wells in creeks and streams before spilling over crests and embankments, and you find you need to pull the car onto the shoulder before you crash.

It comes regardless. Parked on a sagging shoulder, forehead on the steering wheel. It was as inevitable as the quiet moon slowly rising through the lifting rain and parting clouds, casting it's cold and indifferent spotlight straight through your driver's side window like an accusation. You find you cannot consent to the eye contact the pale orb demands. You refuse because She knows your secret. You did not drive all those many miles on some spiritual road trip, a deliberate bid for a spirit guide's counsel, or some sort of divine approval. Nor was this interstate voyage some nostalgic odyssey past the beautiful city where you studied your passions, or through the state you spent many a day and night on your stomach, binoculars glued to your face, life journal at the ready. This wasn't some vacation, and you know it.

You simply hadn't realized, when your hero and surrogate parental figure asked this favor, just what you would find.

Truth hits everybody. And here it hits head on as you sit in a beat-up rusty station wagon, informing you what you have known, but would not or could not acknowledge. You are terrified. Terrified of becoming just like that kindly old man you paid visit today. Demented and incomprehensible. (Will I one day drink to drown unknown demons? Will I no longer recognize where I am or know when someone is speaking? Will I still know the date or who is President?) And inevitably, as they tend to do, your thoughts wander easily to another of your acquaintance, a friend whose brains had been eaten and spit out by some horrid and unspeakable evil, leaving your friend irrevocably damaged.

And then, as if a veil had lifted, you feel drained and too tired to continue the journey the rest of the way tonight.

A cheap motel, a clean bed, and a hot breakfast lightens your mood. Your mind wanders to the notes from the night before, and you find that within its sheets, an inspiring and life affirming article is just begging to be written. But it can wait until you get home and out of the state that will always seem just a little gloomier.


	2. mixedup stereo

(a/n: not an introspective piece…. Inspired by another kink meme captcha prompt, and Ric Ocasek. For some reason.)

Mixed-up stereo

_Just leave it to me,_ she breathes. She is all confidence, and he can't help but to admire that. But they have an intricate dynamic, compliment each other in ways he can't always articulate, and so he abandons his post, and slides easily to her side. They are the wind. They never had a chance.

The irony isn't lost on him. Ten years after…after, he currently finds himself doing the very sort of job he fought desperately to avoid. Working in a bank. A teller at a branch in Western Washington State. It isn't exactly what his father had in mind, but its close enough to make him wonder if he has even failed at being a failure. _It's only cover, only to be _normal, _only to blend in. _Secretly, he wished for this eventuality.

The young men, kids really, neither of them is over twenty, wished that perhaps today ripping off car stereos was effort enough. They lie in a heap, broken bones, bruised ribs, and wounded pride. The customers inside, their almost-hostages are motionless, unsure whether to yell and scream, or applaud.

The bank teller and his wife are catching their breath, they both look surprised, and they both look _bothered. _As they compose themselves, there are encroaching sirens. The police are on the way. They do not stay.

*

They are moving quietly, in unison as to not attract undue attention. A new town, a new state, and new names.

In the car, the stereo plays. New Wave. It's not really his thing, but she convinces him that any band from his college town is worth a listen.

(_It's all mixed up)_

and it really is.


	3. warplanes boyhood

a/n yet another KM captcha prompt. Thanks to my hubby for his expertise in model building :D

Warplanes boyhood

Age eleven:

Danny Dreiberg spends most of his afternoons in his parents' basement. Unlike the other boys from his neighborhood, usually playing football, sneaking into the cinema, or otherwise getting into god knows what, Danny can almost always be found here. Next to the familiar _bang bang bang_ of the clothes spinning madly in his mother's Lady Kenmore, it is not uncommon to see him hunched over his worktable; his own private world tucked in a little corner in the dank and musty basement. The naked light bulb dangles precariously from a wire over the table, only barely succeeding at fighting off the darkness in that windowless part of the house. Several wooden model fighter planes hang from the ceiling in a mock dogfight. This is a bloodless battle, though, as he hates to damage them. Even if it isn't as realistic.

Age fifteen:

Today after school Dan finds himself sitting in his father's office, in his father's huge cigar scented leather office chair, at his father's unnecessarily massive ornate oak desk, listening to his father lecture him about how one day he will have the exalted honor of spending his life chained to the very same desk at which he currently sits. Dan is so thrilled at the idea he does not even put down his pencil or look up from the blueprints of the model P51-A Mustang he is drafting.

Age eight:

The hobby shop's walls seem as if they are built of nothing but rectangular boxes. Little Danny carefully pulls one free, tongue sticking out of a corner of his mouth, because if he doesn't do this carefully, if he messes up even a tiny bit, the whole thing could cascade down all around, boxes haphazardly strewn at his feet, opening up and spilling the contents everywhere. Not that he has any personal experience with that sort of thing ever happening. He pays no mind to the old bearded man in the greasy overalls and blue and white striped conductors cap. He lets out a breath and smiles triumphantly when the box comes free from the stack without incident.

He opens the box reverentially, awe and wonder writ plain across his soft features. His chocolate brown eyes sparkle, and the old man nods at him with something like appreciation. The smell of balsa wafts up and hits his nostrils, and it smells better than his mother's famous chocolate cake, or clothes fresh from the dryer, or bread from the bakery down the street.

The wooden pieces are pre-cut, and this kit comes with all the paint and decals he is going to need. He closes up the box, makes his way over to the old man in the railroad conductor's cap, and hands him the $1.75. The man bags up the model kit, and on his way out the door, little Danny tells him he wants to build a model plane with an engine next. One that really can fly. The man smiles, and tells him he has the perfect kit. He sets it aside. For next week.

Age nineteen:

It is not a model warplane he drafts secretly in his rented Somerville apartment. It's better.


	4. Mixed Signals

From this high in the air, Laurie isn't sure where the ground ends and the sky begins. It is all pitch black, as if the whole of the world was covered in lampblack ink. Dan is telling her that the vast expanse of desert below her is in fact the state of Nevada, but it could be outer space for all she could see. Outer space. She snorts, because that is actually pretty funny stuff. One night while scrolling through the radio dial, watching the thin red strip race past the pale numbers imprisoned behind a wall of clear plastic, she ended up on some call-in talk show discussing a recent rash of UFO sightings out there in the desert.

_Was it evidence of a second wave alien invasion?_

_Was the government testing secret weapons technology in retaliation to last fall's assault?_

The theories were endless.

"I didn't realize the Comstock Lode was that funny," he says with a frown.

"Hmm?" She isn't sure what he means, when she remembers that she snorted. Out loud. "Oh. No," she says with a laugh. She mimes placing a telephone receiver to her ear. "Sorry to bother you at work, hun. But I _just saw a UFO_!" She explodes in a fit of giggles. The radio program is something of an in-joke between an unassuming Boeing engineer and his self-defense instructor wife. This joke is the only concession they make, the only acknowledgement of their duel existence.

She can't read the look on his face, withdrawn and far away. He gets up from the pilot's seat and heads for the coffee maker, and she wonders if she has offended him. Allowed the lie that is their daytime lives in this space meant for Dan and Laurie. Not those nine-to-five punch-clock strangers, in their painfully average suburban Seattle home and two-car garage.

She slides up behind him, wraps her arms around his waist. "I'm sorry," she whispers into the back of his neck.

"Forget it," he says, too quickly. He shrugs out of her embrace and passes her a paper cup. "Say when."

"When." The cup isn't very full.

"You sure?"

"Yeah," she says.

The tension is uncomfortable, and Dan decides Archie is off limits for arguments. This space is _theirs,_ the only concession to any sort of personal freedom, the only time they can be _themselves_ and dammit, it is not going to be contaminated by petty bickering. "Look, I'm sorry," he starts, staring at his warped and wavering reflection in the murky blackness of the paper cup. "I know I get carried away, and I guess I should be used to that. But. I don't know. I just thought…"

Laurie starts laughing, relief washing over her cheeks like a gentle rinse of water. She thought he was angry. Or resentful. Their secrecy is taxing, for both of them. "Oh, Dan. I am so sorry for tuning out your _History of Nevada_ back there. I didn't mean it." She sets her coffee down, gently spins him to face her, and threads her arms up his back, under his shirt. "I would love to hear all about the Silver State," she says, although her tone suggests her interest is anything but academic. "Whenever you want."

He nods and gives a small snort as he begins unbuttoning her shirt.

She reciprocates, and there is no rush, no world ending urgency. This space, this time, and this moment is theirs, and no silver mines, no radio conspiracies, no deserts, no strangers wearing their faces can reach them.


	5. Eric deity I Feel Free!

Captcha prompt :Eric deity

A bit of silliness written (while drunk!) for the kinkmeme.

_Bum bum bum bum bum bump. Bum bum bum bum bum bump. (I feel free)_

The sounds reverberate off the tunnel walls like an out-of-control ping-pong ball, and all Rorschach can think to articulate to the running sewage and infestation of rats is, "hrm, may as well post signage."

It is worse than he anticipated, however, when he arrives through the underground entrance into the Owl's Nest.

Daniel, wearing greasy work clothes and a goofy grin, is dancing. A wrench serves as a make-shift microphone while the Owlship's on-board stereo system blasts some ungodly wannabe blues music.

_Feel, when I dance with you._

_We move like the sea._

_You… you're all I want to know_

_I feel free!_

"Dance with me!" He yells when he notices the masked man.

"Don't dance! Especially not to…_this. _Not even American! Not decent." He hates to yell, but the music is much to loud.

"Oh, come on! It'll be fun! You know what fun is, right?"

"Suspect you may have been drinking. Crime waits for no man. Suggest you put on your uniform."

"Aww, you're no fun," he says in mock indignation. "And no, I haven't been drinking."

*

The city lights from above belie the brutality of gangs and drug lords below at street level. This is what they are meant to do, and as they disembark the rotund flying vessel, Dan notices for the first time newly sprayed graffiti.

_Clapton is God._

And while he was sure this was phenomenon found only across the pond, he can't help but to flash a knowing smile to his partner. And maybe he feels just a tad smug at the apparent affirmation.

When they return from their night-time adventures, instead on turning in and calling it a night, Dan instead puts on a pot of coffee. And a record.

Rorschach growls disapprovingly when Dan explains the reason the band is called "Cream," but the masked man agrees to stay for coffee anyway.

_*_

a/n: Yeah. I swore up and down I would not write any variation of "Rorschach comes in through tunnel, finds Dan doing something silly." This only exists because I was smashed out of my gourd. Also, I needed a bit of a pick-me-up. *shrugs*


	6. Moving In and Moving On

Summary: Post GN Dan & Laurie. This takes place shortly before Mixed Signals.

*

The moving van idles in the driveway, the driver inside stares blankly at the garage door to the house he knows is home now, and it's the vibration of the engine that does it. The way the gentle mechanical rhythm snakes up through his body, through his hands placed two and ten on the steering wheel, up through his arms into his heart. Lets the panic in. Claustrophobia and fight or flight and the two o'clock hand moves over the ignition, finds itself turning the key. He never hears the other van's door slam, or the shouts of "Hey!" and "Where the hell do you think you're going?" chasing after him. He only hears the sound the tires make against the pavement as he peels away.

The drive does cool his blood, the ringing in his ears fades, but it's his ragged breath, caged in his chest, that he wants to tune out most, erase away. The radio doesn't provide the desired aural escape; it offers instead mostly noise. Music he doesn't really get, or chatter from disappointed sports broadcasters lamenting the Seahawk's poor performance this past season, and all this does is crystallize that out-of-context feeling he'd been trying to shake ever since he'd gotten here.

He doesn't want to go too far, knows Lau— knows _she _won't be too far behind, so he pulls over on the soft shoulder, and kills the engine.

The road is quiet, with only a car passing by every few minutes or so. It's nothing like the congestion of New York, or the driving hell known as Boston. Instead, with the tree line only feet away from the road, and the thin, brown dried needles underfoot, this place reminds him strongly of a different part of his East Coast upbringing, of New Hampshire. Of summers in childhood spent at his family's summer home in Wolfeboro, and later during his college years when he would drive up there some weekends to get away from city and school life if only for a day or two.

He picks up a small pinecone and a handful of pebbles. Places them in his pocket. Later, he will set them up on a windowsill, like a ward. But for now, they don't so much as receive a second thought as he notices the other moving van making its way toward him.

*

"There he is," she says. And she isn't angry. Not now. Earlier, seeing the van pull out of the driveway only moments before even pulling in, that was a different story. Left standing there, pushing down the urge to run after it with arms flailing, because making a scene isn't going to win them any friends or allies, so vital in making this whole thing work. Not now though, not here, on this quiet road. She suppresses a smile as she watches him brush dirt from his hands.

She slams the driver's side door, makes a show of annoyance, because this behavior isn't acceptable, even if she understands his reason, understands his compulsion. It wouldn't be the first time.

"_It's quarter past three," she says, not really sure just what to make of finding him down here._

"_I know," is all he has to offer, as if that were explanation enough._

The gravel makes a satisfying crunch underfoot, and she is sure the stern face coupled with her arms on her hips creates the right impression, though she's not sure how long she can hold it in before the façade breaks.

He's looking at his hands, picking grit from underneath his fingernails, the guilt and shame set plain across his face. But it's his hair, too short and entirely the _wrong _color that undoes her.

She clamps her hand to her mouth, and she finds she can no longer contain it. The laughter comes rolling out like the ocean, and it's a moment of freedom she didn't realize she needed.

"Oh, god," she breathes, "I'm not laughing at you. I just—"

In a flash, her arms are around his neck, and gentle kisses flutter at his ear.

"Dan," she breathes, and oh god, he had no idea just how much he needed to hear his own name.

She— Laurie, because it's okay to acknowledge that, takes his hands and looks into his eyes. "We'll be okay, you know. We'll make it." She stares intently into his eyes, willing her words to connect.

He nods, and she continues.

"We just have to make time. For _ourselves." _

"You're right," he offers, a wicked smile creeping in, "I know just the thing."

Life often is unpredictable, but there are always patterns to be found in nature, and if this idea feels familiar to him, it's only because it's the right one.

*

Sam and Sandra Hollis spend the rest of the afternoon unpacking the moving vans, hauling boxes and furniture everything that makes up a life. Sam doesn't need to report to the Everett plant for another two weeks, and in the interim, the couple is often seen around town, getting to know their environment, and their neighbors. They can be found antiquing, or mini-golfing, or sipping coffee in a quiet shop, or any number of unassuming activities. And if strange lights begin appearing in the night skies over Puget Sound, this pair of ordinary suburbanites probably wouldn't know a thing about it. Probably**.**


	7. The Time Machine

A record store is not unlike a time machine, Dan thinks to himself. Vinyl records stored in their cramped dusty boxes, sitting on top of tables, or underneath them, or haphazardly piled along walls and under windows, each one a gateway to another time and another place. Outside the on the street, past the walls and glass door, it is the New York of 1979. But on the inside, at least, within his headspace underneath the pair of bulky headphones, it is still New York, only it's the New York of 1947, and a lady sings her blues. Behind closed eyes, he imagines he is sitting in the audience at Carnegie Hall, experiencing the show first hand. Then, in that odd way imagination drifts a person casually away from shore, he is a child again dancing in his mother's kitchen, the fragrance of coffee and eggs still heavy in the air.

This quiet spell may as well be an infinity. He gladly succumbs to losing himself in the moment, his worries willingly forgotten. It had only been two years since a little bill known as the Keene Act passed the Senate, and it had given him a freedom that was anything but liberation.

He feels a body bump up behind him, causing him to drop his armful of records. The bubble burst, spell broken. The girl, maybe in her late teens, though she could be older, sports a shaved head, black lipstick, and black leather pants. She profusely apologizes, scrambles to pick up the spilled sleeves, and it's so incongruous, this frightening specter of a thing, no more than a child, deferential and polite.

He notices the pleasant afternoon from when he first came in has been swapped out for gray, drizzly evening, and he decides grabbing some dinner might not be a bad idea.

The kid behind the register, and he is only a kid with wild hair and unkempt facial growth, probably a student but just as easily not, looks up at Dan before he logs the carefully picked out Gershwin and Miller and Holiday; the evidence of the day's labor, into the register, calculates the cost. His eyes dart to a small pile of records there on the counter, a bored, lazy question hovering on his eyes. Dan picks up a copy, studies it like a cipher. The cover depicts a man in a noose standing on a block of ice. And the imagery feels too ominous, too much like a giving up, and that just isn't what he wants to think about right now. Whatever it's supposed to be, it isn't for him, modern music too much like a foreign language, unfamiliar and easily misinterpreted. The kid just shrugs, complete disinterest in the decision one way or another, and finishes the transaction with an unfelt smile.

*

The rain isn't heavy, it's more mist than anything else, but still has a way of insinuating its way into his clothing, working under his skin until he feels like a sponge.

*

The coffee feels warm in his hands, the liquid a warm balm down his throat. And he sits. And he sometimes writes. And his home is a time machine.


	8. blizzard quietly

blizzard quietly

Years from now this storm will become infamous. People of New England and New York will remember back on the "Blizzard of '78" with a sense of pride for having survived it, as if nature herself threw a test of endurance at the region to determine the mettle of its residents.

This of course, isn't something Dan Dreiberg could possibly know as he holds back a curtain and watches the light snowfall dust his front stoop. In the background, a radio announcer drones on about school closures, an unusual precaution in front of a potentially large storm. Dan isn't really listening, he's thinking about how he probably should trudge out and pick up an extra loaf of bread, an extra gallon of milk. He knows the routine well, remembers how even a small amount of snow accumulation can bring out the panicked hordes, depleting the stores of essential (and sometimes non-essential) items.

The weather forecasters haven't exactly had the best success this winter, either, Dan thinks as he shrugs into his coat and stuffs his house keys into a pocket. Only two weeks earlier eighteen inches of snow had fallen, when all the experts called for rain.

The city sidewalk still has only a fine sugarcoating underfoot, and at six am, he belatedly hopes the corner store is open.

He forgets, sometimes that he isn't quite yet on the same circadian rhythm as the rest of the world. Years of awake at night/asleep in day and his body is still conditioned to this pattern. Altering his sleep schedule flat out only resulted in frustrating insomnia and frozen TV dinners in front of late night movies, or worse, dead air.

He flips his collar up as the precipitation begins to increase. He notices his breath curl before him like steam as he spots the storeowner up ahead, watches the man insert his key and push the door open.

"How long will you be open today," Dan asks the man, when he too ducks inside the store.

"S'longs I can," the man answers. "S'pose to get a delivery this afternoon, but I don't think that's gonna be happening."

Dan just nods. It's simply going to be a waiting game. Wait and see. He drifts toward the aisles, collects some things he needs (and some things he doesn't) before wishing the storeowner a sincere 'good luck' as he makes his purchases.

The snow's picked up since he'd been inside, the fine sugar dusting giving way to enough depth to leave shoe prints, and with enough pedestrians, the treads could turn to dirty mush. Only, there are no other people out here, perhaps more wisely, and the constant _crunch crunch crunch_ underfoot is the only sound he hears. The snowfall creates a kind of soundproof blanket, and the effect is eerie. This is hardly his first snowstorm, likely won't be his last, but he is surprised at how _quiet _it is. The whole world could be this quiet and he wouldn't be at all surprised.

A snowplow thunders by, the quiet enveloping the interruption in its wake.

When he gets home, his house is quiet. The snowfall outside becomes increasingly heavy through the course of the day. Everything outside is covered in a cold white blanket, and there are no sounds.

When all is said and done, the city is crippled. It will take several days to clean it all up, and in the meantime, some folks, young and not so young, take advantage of all the snow. People can be seen skiing on 5th Avenue in a scene more fitting for a painting than reality. Or children throwing snowballs or building snowmen. Mirth belying the severity of the damage done, the toll in resources and in lives.

Years from now, Dan Dreiberg will trudge through the snow. He will be disquieted, and he probably won't be feeling any sense pride for surviving. But of course this isn't something he could possibly know now, as he sees all the snow, piled so high he won't be able to leave through his front door for a couple of days. He closes the curtains and looks for a book to read.

Something quiet.


	9. A Dream

A Dream

In your dream, you stand before a precipice. You don't think this is a place you've been to before, it reminds you very much of The Grand Canyon. Perhaps it is; perhaps it's a lip to another world, but whatever—wherever—it is, it's diffuse and drab. The wind whips all around you, behind you, and your hair flows freely as if underwater.

You're not afraid of the height, not afraid of the fall. You think you probably should be. It feels right to be here. You kick a few pebbles; watch them as they tumble soundlessly into the vast empty abyss.

The wind changes and you find yourself in freefall.

Large claws grasp you, pulls you up, up, up. You know you probably should feel relief, should feel grateful at your rescuer, but as you crane your head to look at the man riding the large winged creature, make eye contact with him, you find things like anger and resentment welling up from somewhere deep inside. You aren't sure if these things are directed at him.

You both stand now at the same precipice from which you stumbled, and you recognize this for what it is: a choice.

He apologizes, says he only intended to help. You know this.

The resentment fades, changes into something closer to confusion. You wanted to do this on your own. Land on your own feet. It isn't his fault. You made this choice, you chose. Only you.

You wake, slowly. Consciousness reasserts itself in gentle waves. When you do come back to yourself, you notice the sleeping body beside you. You wonder what he dreams of. His sweaty hair sticks to his forehead, and a line of what is likely saliva glistens at his mouth; a small dark pool of it sits on his pillow, and it isn't very attractive, not by a long shot, but it's real. It's human. You don't know what's going to happen, neither of you do, but you do know that this was the right way to go, the right choice to make. This isn't a failing. He can't do this on his own, either.

You no longer feel such guilt at this. No longer worry about the selfishness of it. You wonder if perhaps he isn't being a bit selfish as well, and that's okay. At least it's something you can relate to. Something you can understand. You kiss him on the forehead and drift off, as weightless as a feather.


End file.
